Samsung Galaxy Note Edge First Look: Ahead of the Curve and Classy

Samsung is accustomed to rumors, but no one would have thought that the South Korean giant would release a unique phone at this year's IFA Berlin tech how.

Little was known about the Galaxy Note Edge; a phablet with a curved edge that truly makes it different from other competitive devices. So far Samsung has remained tight-lipped about a release date. The phone has already been out in the US; meanwhile, no release date has been announced in respect of India.

The Note Edge offers a new take on the curved screen. The handset looks stunning, and it features a screen which curves round the edge of the handset. Otherwise, the premium phone is no different from the Galaxy Note 4. It comes with a 5.6-inch QHD screen, the Snapdragon 805 processor, 3GB of RAM, a 16-megapixel rear-facing camera, the S-Pen, and the 3,200mAh battery fitted inside.

We recently got a chance to play around with the Samsung Galaxy Note Edge at the ongoing Samsung Developers Conference in San Francisco. Here are our first impressions of the Samsung Galaxy Note Edge.

Samsung has a new dashing handset, the Galaxy Note Edge, which features a new screen tech. The Note Edge is thinner and lighter than the Galaxy Note 4. The device measures 8.3 mm thick and it weighs in at 174 grams. It feels great in your hand without being too bulky.

Once again, Samsung has used plastic materials to build the Galaxy Note Edge. It also has the same faux leather removable back cover, but overall we found the device sturdy and reliable. In fact, there's more metal in the overall design.

Let's talk about the most important aspect of the Galaxy Note Edge: Curved screen. As mentioned earlier, the Note Edge has a curved screen but with a difference. Samsung demoed it long time back but it's finally made into a commercial product.

As you can see from out first-look pictures, the device has a screen which curves around the edge of the handset. The extra screen, dubbed Edge Screen, can be used to offer live notifications or it even used as controls while watching a full movie screen. Well, the main purpose of having the edge screen is to make information more glance-able. In fact, it acts as stock ticker. The ticker bar also acts as an app tray for easy access to your must have apps.

There are several ways to customize the edge screen, and since the SDK is open it's likely to get more apps in the near future. Yes indeed, the device is truly far ahead of time, however, our only concern is that the screen around the edge of the phone means greater chance of the screen cracking when it falls.

The Note Edge has a 5.6-inch QHD screen, with a resolution of 2,560 x 1,440 pixels. It uses Samsung's award winning Super AMOLED display panel. At the same time, the Note Edge is slightly smaller than the Galaxy Note 4's 5.7-inch QHD screen.

We pretty much like the implementation, and of course, the core idea of having the edge screen. But the question is whether it's just a gimmick or not. We've used the device for short period of time so it's hard to come up with our final verdict.

The Galaxy Note 4 and Note Edge run Android 4.4 (Kitkat) with Samsung's UI layered on top of Android, although there are different settings for the Edge screen. The user interface (UI) is tailor made for the Galaxy Note Edge. For instance, if you are a lefty, all you need to flip the phone upside-down, and the entire display will rotate 180 degrees.

Being a part of Note family, the Galaxy Note Edge comes with updated S-Pen stylus which now has a new sensitivity level of 2048 and the ability to be used like a computer mouse. Like the Note 4, there are a couple of useful features such as Multi-Window, among others.